


did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind (in some loyal heart is your memory enshrined?)

by OverlyCheerfulRat



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Captain America: The First Avenger, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Tragedy, Tragic Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:08:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25979488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OverlyCheerfulRat/pseuds/OverlyCheerfulRat
Summary: Steve can't get drunk and has no choice but to remember.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 3
Kudos: 32





	did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind (in some loyal heart is your memory enshrined?)

Steve sits in the bar, looks at his glass, and thinks about an apartment in Brooklyn. He thinks about gelled-back brown hair and a cocky grin. He thinks about dancing, spinning around in the arms of someone he shouldn't love until the world around them is gone.

He closes his eyes and sees a boy cleaning out the scrapes on his knees, a teenager rubbing his back while he coughs, a man whispering his name, rank, and social security number on a metal table. 

He sees the past reality, where they could only touch in the dark, where their fingers grazed for just a moment in theaters and on the side of a train, where they could be together but not in love. He sees the future reality, where he will wake up to cold sheets, where empty rooms will echo with a dead man's laughter.

His fingers burn with the memory of one last touch, one last almost, one last miss. He has to cut his hand off, because how can he live knowing he could have saved him, almost reached him, got so close before he lost everything? 

His head pounds, and he is drunk on everything he will never do, drowning in an ocean of moments he will never experience, kisses that will never be, words he will never hear. He sees a lovely fantasy, a dream with wedding bands and picket fences and kisses in public, and he knows it would never have happened. He sees a bittersweet false memory, a dim future hope with stolen glances and shared beds and quiet hidden love, and he mourns the dream they could have lived.

He sees a man who will never grow old, who will be 28 forever, juxtaposed with the boy he grew up with who wanted to marry him before they learned it was a sin. He sees a headstone over an empty grave, he sees a broken corpse decaying in a ravine, he sees unrecovered bones. He sees sisters waiting for a brother who promised to come home and never meant to lie.

He sees the unlived life and the unshed tears and the unsaid words. He sees the decades they could have spent together, the soft warm bed he should have died in, the loved ones who should have been with him. He sees the snow and cold metal and hands that just barely touched for the last time.

He sees years he can't survive alone, and he knows he won't have to, knows he'll throw himself into every battle recklessly, knows he'll jump in front of every bullet he can. He has nothing now, no one waiting for him to come home, just photographs and memories of a man who held him in the night and danced with him in the living room and believed in him when no one else did. 

His heart is beating in his chest, and his heart will never beat again, and he can't live.


End file.
